“A gated-off garden in a Midtown park will finally reopen to the public this month, prompting celebration from neighbors . . ..”

“... locked behind a high iron fence at the First Avenue edge of the park is what the Parks Department website calls a ‘secret garden’: a pretty, grassy greensward planted with mature magnolia trees, tulips, irises, and rose bushes. In truth, it is not so much secret — anyone can peer in — as it is private. It’s off-limits to all but the children and parents of St. Vartan Preschool, a small playgroup that meets there on weekday mornings under the guidance of . . . a Parks Department employee . . . for more than two decades. And the secret is out . . .

Kevin O’Keefe . . . started trying to figure out the story behind the locked garden. ‘If you look at the map, Midtown Manhattan is starved for green space between First and Tenth Avenue,’ he said. ‘I talked to a lot of people, and they told me . . . that it couldn’t be changed. St. Vartan Preschool had access to it, but not the community.’ On its website, the school boasted of a ‘pristine’ and ‘private’ garden ‘where the children can run freely.’ But the school served a tiny number of students — perhaps a dozen at a time — and admissions, as far as O’Keefe could tell, seem to be based on . . . whims and the requirement that parents attend with their children, ruling out families in which both parents work . . .

The more he learned, the more frustrated O’Keefe became.. . . O’Keefe said that a pack of local Cub Scouts used to work in the garden, picking up trash and pulling weeds, and although their labor was welcome twice a year, that was the only time they were.

And then there was the thing with Tom Brady’s son . . . a local mother, Erica Rand Silverman . . . noted that she and her 8-year-old had walked past the garden a few weeks earlier and spotted what looked like a private picnic . . . O’Keefe said that when he brought it up with [the Parks Department employee], she’d responded, ‘Oh, well, that was Tom Brady’s son.’

’It needs to be open to the community — we started out with that in mind,’ said O’Keefe. ‘But this so-called preschool took this space that was supposed to be for the public good and turned it into a bastion of inequity.’

Parks doesn’t yet have a date for when the garden will open, but there will be a trial period this fall . . . When it does open, it will be the first time in many months that anyone besides [the Parks Department employee], her family, and her occasional child-of-a-supermodel-and-a-quarterback guests will have passed beyond the gates.”

“While we love an action-packed park or playground, there’s something magical about an off-the-beaten-path enclave, too . . . overflowing with lush greenery and beautiful flowers make for a different kind of escape and cool way to commune with nature . . . While not a hidden garden, per se, this section of St. Vartan Park has long been closed to the public, but the gates recently swung open to allow visitors to explore the patch of green space on the east end of the park . . . the area was inaccessible . . . that’s no longer the case.”

“. . . Murray Hill residents and neighbors were excited to see the gated doors opened to the public once more . . . ”

“[St. Vartan Park’s] eastern end—the only peaceful-looking, green section—lies locked behind iron bars.”

“Athough the era of social reform in the early 20th century was still driven by government and charitable organizations, in many ways farm gardens were early manifestations of a community gardening aesthetic . . . farm gardens existed in one form or other through the 1960s . . . included St. Vartan’s Park, which opened in 1931.”

“During the Second World War the United States . . . experienced significant food shortages, as the majority of the country’s food supply was being sent overseas to aid in the war effort. In response, government organizations encouraged citizens to plant ‘victory gardens’ to help ease the burden . . . As hard as it may be to believe today, there was a . . . sizable garden . . . located in Midtown, spreading its leaves in the shade of the Chrysler Building . . . In addition to growing food, victory gardens provided the added benefits of boosting morale and creating communities throughout the United States.”

“A new garden was opened . . . on July 20th, 1931, and was used by over 5,000 children during the summer. The crops were very good considering that the site of the garden was formerly covered by broken concrete and stone, which was partially removed and soil added . . . within the shadows of the Empire State Building, offers a very pleasing contrast to that modern, very busy hive of industry, as it presents . . . a Department of Parks Children’s Garden, with its trees, shrubs, flowers and vegetables planted and cared for by children of the neighborhood. It suggests peace and rest within its green borders as the quaint little Colonial House (used as an office and tool shed) peacefully nestling within its shrubs, recalls the quotation, ‘Let me live in a house by the roadside where humanity passes by.’”

“. . . a large, unused plot, at the east end of the park, surrounded by an iron picket fence, was put to use as a ball field. The fence was removed and the ground drained and graded.”

“A large plot at the easterly end of the park . . . had been left unimproved and was surrounded by a solid wooden fence . . . The cutting off of this plot took a considerable portion from the already very limited park area of this section of the city. There being no particular reason why this plot should not be made available at once, the fence was taken down, the old tool house removed and the ground levelled and graded. A wooden rail fence was then erected and the plot thrown open and has since been used as a baseball ground . . .”